In rare test, Merkel to face down party rebels on refugees

BERLIN, Dec 8 (Reuters) - In past years, Angela Merkel has
been feted like a superstar at annual meetings of her Christian
Democratic Union (CDU) party, earning thunderous ovations for
defending German interests in the euro crisis and facing down
Vladimir Putin over Ukraine.

But a CDU congress in the southwestern city of Karlsruhe
next week is shaping up to be a very different affair. Under
intense pressure from conservative allies to reduce the flood of
refugees into Germany, the 61-year-old chancellor faces the
biggest test of her authority from within the party in years.

The influential youth wing of the party has openly defied
her in the run-up to the glitzy two-day event by demanding she
agree to an "Obergrenze", or cap on the number of asylum seekers
Germany accepts - a step she has repeatedly rejected on the
grounds it would be impossible to enforce.

Her Bavarian allies, the Christian Social Union (CSU), have
been pressing for a cap for months, and even some of Merkel's
own ministers are lobbying openly for a tougher stance from the
chancellor, who marked 10 years in office last month and must
decide by next autumn whether she will seek a fourth term in
2017.

"Merkel has never endured such sharp criticism from within
her own ranks since becoming chancellor," read a front-page
editorial in conservative daily newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine
Zeitung on Monday. "Under no circumstances can she allow the
congress to approve a resolution on refugee policy that includes
the word 'Obergrenze'."

Two recent developments are working in Merkel's favour ahead
of the meeting in Karlsruhe, a city which sits near the border
between Baden-Wuerttemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate, two of
three German states that will hold elections in March.

First, the number of migrants arriving in Germany has slowed
significantly since late November, largely because of colder
weather which has made it more difficult for refugees to travel
from Turkey to Greece and then up through the Balkans.

"It's too early to declare a change in the trend but it is
positive," Interior Minister Thomas de Maiziere said on Monday.

Also, a sharp months-long slide in support for Merkel and
her conservative bloc appears to have come to a halt.

An Emnid survey last weekend put the CDU/CSU on 37 percent,
up from 36 percent a month ago, and still 12 points ahead of the
rival Social Democrats (SPD). A separate poll from Infratest
dimap showed Merkel's popularity rising 5 points to 54 percent.

"I see a lot of support in the party for Angela Merkel's
course," CDU General Secretary Peter Tauber said at the weekend,
dismissing suggestions her authority was waning.

'CATASTROPHIC MOOD'

But some CDU members described the mood in the party as
abysmal.

For the first time in years, off-the-record conversations
with lawmakers in Berlin are littered with criticisms of Merkel,
echoing the era before she became chancellor when a cabal of
conservative men worked behind the scenes to undermine the
protestant pastor's daughter from communist East Germany.

Last week, former Saxony justice minister Steffen Heitmann
became the first prominent member of the CDU to announce he was
leaving the party. In a letter to Merkel which was leaked to the
media, he said he had never felt "so foreign in my own country".

The atmosphere could not be more different than it was back
in 2012, when at a CDU congress in Hanover, Merkel was
re-elected party leader by 98 percent of delegates, a score so
high that German reporters jokingly likened it to the sham
elections of East German leaders during Merkel's youth.

"The mood among conservative members of parliament is really
catastrophic right now," said one senior CDU lawmaker, declining
to be named. "Merkel is totally isolated."

"She needs to wake up," said another top ranking party
member. "Merkel's solution to this crisis depends on the
goodwill of people like (Russian President Vladimir) Putin and
(Turkish President Tayyip) Erdogan. It simply won't work."

A close aide to the chancellor, speaking on condition of
anonymity, played down the extent of the discontent, estimating
that only a third of party members were really in favour of a
tougher course, through caps, border closures or more radical
measures.

Merkel has resisted such steps, arguing that the influx must
be tackled outside Germany, through negotiations to resolve the
war in Syria and by encouraging neighbouring Turkey to improve
conditions for refugees there and convincing European partners
to accept quotas of asylum seekers.

"Merkel will not budge on this," the aide said. "If there
really is a majority at the congress for caps on refugees, this
would point to a problem at the top, but we don't expect this."
(Additional reporting by Paul Carrel; Writing by Noah Barkin;
Editing by Pravin Char)